


hiding in the future, hiding from the past

by Lilaciliraya



Category: Criminal Minds
Genre: Bullying, Canon Compliant, Eating Disorders, Gen, High School, I Don't Even Know, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, Maybe - Freeform, Mother-Son Relationship, POV Second Person, POV Spencer Reid, Past, Pre-Canon, Sad Spencer, Tags Are Hard, Well - Freeform, Young Spencer, finals are killing me, kind of, not really but just in case he doesn't really have a normal realtionship with food, so im going to leave that there, what even
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-06
Updated: 2016-12-06
Packaged: 2018-09-06 21:58:11
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,065
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8770921
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lilaciliraya/pseuds/Lilaciliraya
Summary: This is what you know: you are nine and the world is so empty, and you are so, so small, and everything is sad and the darkness only comes so it can leave again.





	

**Author's Note:**

> i wrote this because its 4 am and i have a final tomorrow and hey engineering isn't hard at all who needs to study. kill me. anyways. i don't really know why this happened but it's kind of how i picture spencer's whole life just happening around. around and around and around. history repeats itself and all that jazz? god i am so tired okay. ill just leave this here and forget i ever wrote it.
> 
> i stole the beginning (like the first line but also every actual situation lul) from another one of my fics bc i thought wow this fits with spencer so if you want to read something better than this go check that out >>> peeling from the inside out

The first thing you notice in high school, and yes, it is truly the first, your memory makes it easy to categorize things like this, is that nobody likes the boy in the sweater vest. 

 

Your second observation, as you write in the margin of your notebook later that day for the busyness of the act, is that their dislike for you may also have something to do with the fact that you are nine years old. 

 

You are nine years old and in high school and they don’t like what’s different and right now you are very, very different. You’ve always been different.

 

But they see what they feel they should have been in you, something special, something worthwhile. You get the feeling that maybe they don’t like you because they think it’s all too easy for you, and all the while they’ve been struggling to just be normal. They don’t have outstanding so they try to take it from you.

 

You don’t bother telling them that your mother is very very sick and your father is ready to leave and you’re rushing your education, pushing as fast as you can because you’re going to need to support yourself and your mother when he finally gets up the courage to go for good. You’ve seen the signs, and it’s only an advantage if you take the opportunity to prepare.

 

You don’t bother sharing about how you cry yourself to sleep every night and they don’t bother asking. So you let them hurt you and have their fun but you watch. 

 

Always watching, always observing. 

 

\----

 

You realize that everyone is so very sad and the world is so empty and you are so, so small. 

 

You realize nothing you do matters right now. But you watch. And you learn how to copy, how to pretend there’s so much out there even when your cries bounce back at you all tinny and flat and undisturbed by the expanse of nothing that really occupies the space around you. 

 

And the bruises ache but the darkness of your room makes it all go away. Until the sunlight trickles in.

 

And even the darkness hides.

 

\------

 

You aren’t scared of the dark but you’d rather like it if it would stay away because if it never shows up it can never ever leave. You’re terrified that the darkness will leave you exposed.

 

\------

 

They don’t seem to realize that you’re only nine and you’re breakable and fragile and soft and so, so small. 

 

They slam you up against the lockers and whisper bad things in your ear and the ghost of cold metal on your back translates to the taste of fresh blood on your tongue. They leave you frozen in the hallway with your eyes unfocused and lights dotting your vision. 

 

They push too hard and it reminds you of how everyone expects so much, too much.

 

Too much of the world and certainly too much of you. 

 

\-----

 

You’re like the token nerdy kid from the movies and you have to eat alone because there’s a distance between you and the rest of the school that can never be approached and that never has to be acknowledged. 

 

There’s a bench in the hallway you like to sit on because there’s a glass showcase across from it that allows you to see everything around you. You like it because it helps you watch. 

 

And because, scientifically, the best angle for your back happens to be almost the exact degree of recline the seat allows and it’s never too early to worry about these things. 

 

You know how quickly the end can swallow you up, how irreversible the hurt can be. Health can be taken away; your bench can be taken away, too. 

 

\-----

 

The bullies get especially creative one day after school, and you can’t stand sitting across from the glass showcase anymore without feeling so, so small tied up to a goal post on display in the empty, empty world. 

 

You remember watching the darkness fall and praying you wouldn’t have to see it leave as well, and now sitting on your bench you can’t see anything but the shadows being chased away by the harsh fluorescent lighting, retreating and leaving you alone, exposed. 

 

\-----

 

So you need a new place, and you figure the library is perfect. 

 

This is when you realize you were born to collect knowledge, to watch and to learn and to try to fill yourself in a vain attempt to counterbalance the vacuum around you. 

 

And you read and you read and you read, not like your mother read to you, not for fun. You read to know, and you always remember. 

 

Always. 

 

\-----

 

The thing is, though, that you remember reading a book on nutrition and the way that you’re skipping lunch to fill, fill, fill is unquestionably irresponsible. Your mother doesn’t remember to do the grocery shopping much anymore and your dad is never around and you’re only nine, so you can’t really just pack your own lunch. 

 

By now when you walk into the library the woman at the front desk hands you whatever spare fruits or snacks she has sitting around and all but begs you to eat. You’re full, full up with facts but you try to make a little extra room just for her. 

 

You aren’t hungry for real food, never that. So you move on, leave the library, run straight into the big, wide, empty world away from anyone that could ever leave you because in your experience the people are just like the darkness.

 

You think you’ll be fine as long as you keep learning and watching and filling and growing. The inside getting bigger and stronger while the outside balances the border.

 

It almost feels like you’re living on the edge of a shadow, always drawing the darkness in yet always scaring it away, always able to tell that a space is completely empty while others see something occupying it. While they believe in its significance.

 

\-----

 

This is what you know: you are nine and the world is so empty, and you are so, so small, and everything is sad and the darkness only comes so it can leave again.

 

\-----

 

And all your mother can think to say is that, my, Spencer, you’re too thin. And all you’ve ever really learned from watching is that everything always repeats. 

 

Always.

 

\-----

**Author's Note:**

> wow thanks for reading cant believe we made it here cry about spencer with me. thanks. love you bye.  
> side note: i didn't counT the dashes so if there was kind of a pattern and i broke it im sorry and if you didn't even notice then ignore this cool cool


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